“It was a once in a lifetime opportunity to come here,” said David Blair, who traveled to the conference from the United Kingdom. “As soon as it was announced, I booked the hotel and bought the ticket right away.”

Those attending say getting together with those who share their beliefs is a nice change of pace to the ridicule they usually receive.

“It’s not a way to make friends and impress your family because if they’re not willing to look, they’re going to think you’re crazy,” said David Weiss of Connecticut.

Beliefs vary within the flat-earth community, but most argue the earth is a disc surrounded by an ice wall.

They also claim NASA has doctored all the images of earth which show a curved horizon or spherical shape.

“I was doing a podcast about conspiracies and people were sending me this flat earth stuff and I was deleting it, banning people from our social media, and then I looked,” said Weiss. “I spent about two weeks really digging in and trying to debunk this and that’s how you become a ‘flat earther.’”

Those attending the conference say they’ve noticed an increase of popularity for flat-earth ideals the past few years.

“The last 2-3 years, it’s really taken off,” said Justin Harvey, from Orlando. “I’m not sure what the reason is for that, maybe it’s just time.”